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Friday, March 12, 2010

A Tense Day in the Old City of Jerusalem

Well, today there was more tension in the Old City, and the entire city was closed to visiting Palestinians in the afternoon. I'm not quite sure how they worked that, but they were checking papers and it looked like women, children, and men over 50 were allowed into the city while others were turned away. All the gates had between 15 and 100 soldiers around them, and there were large groups of soldiers all over the Old City. I didn't feel unsafe at all, but it was interesting to be at the center of what was a fairly tense situation.

In addition, I discovered a new photoshop plugin, Topaz Adjust, and I got the free 30 day trial installed. Basically its an easy way to make a lot of different color and exposure adjustment to images. You can make them all HDR-ish and overdo it, but it also makes it super easy to make images have a slight pop to them. All of the following images were created using it, some with only slight adjustments, and a few with pretty intense adjustments (tho I don't think they are overdone).

Herod's Gate:

Damascus Gate:

A random street, this one is the heaviest use of HDR-type processing, and I'm quite pleased with it. For handheld shooting with no tripod, or for people or animals that will move between shots, I think I have found my favorite new plugin!

A main intersection inside the Old City near the Western Wall:

A doorway on a rooftop near the Church of the Holy Sepulchre:

The King of Jerusalem:

A Cute little kid with an owie, having a grand old time near his home in the Old City:

Soldiers Everywhere, but still lots of tourists and about half the shops open: